THE SHOWER SPEECH YOU MIGHT WANT TO SHELVE
By Lisa Earle McLeod www.forgetperfect.com
You know it’s bad when you start practicing the speeches. You know, the little speeches you rehearse in your head for the grand and glorious moment when you finally get to tell so-and-so what you really think about them. Your monologue gets more brilliant each day as you practice it over and over again in you car or shower, clarifying your thoughts, honing your points, preparing for that big day when you finally let them have it. The stunning clarity and accuracy with which you deliver your soliloquy will be amazing. It’s fantasy you can practically taste, that beautiful moment when you finally take the filters off and confront them with the truth. The truth about their selfishness and dysfunctions. Or the way they misrepresent facts and manipulate others into taking their side. Or how they blame everyone else for their problems and refuse to take responsibility for their own self-created mess. Or the way they conveniently rewrite history to suit their story and get away with it because nobody is willing to call them on their lies. Or how they hurt people and don’t even seem to care. Oh, it will be a moment alright. Because once you finally speak the truth, there can be no more denials; because, as everyone knows, there is no defense against the truth – the real truth that is. In fact, they will probably be rendered absolutely speechless, because they’ve finally been outed. No more manipulating, no more game playing, no more falsehoods, and no more lies. Now, thanks to you, they have been exposed and the whole world knows who and what they really are. We’ve all been there. Scheming and dreaming about how satisfying it would be to call so-and-so on the carpet for their wicked ways. Whether it’s the crazy sister-in-law, the negative co-worker or the selfish spouse, there’s nothing like the dysfunctions of others to bring out the beast in us. And what makes us even crazier is the way everybody else lets them get away with it. It’s almost like no one but us is willing to see the truth. So we rehearse the speeches, savoring the righteousness of our words as we turn them over and over again in our mind, dreaming of the day when we can expose the evil one. So that God and everybody else will finally know the true nature of their wrongs. Well, guess what? God already knows. God knows all about their silly little games. Just like God knows all about your silly little games, and my silly little games, and all the other ways that we human beings make each other nuts. But God – and feel free to apply that term as literally, conceptually, specifically or vaguely as you like – has decided to love them anyway. Because the mind of God is large enough to hold a person’s negative behavior and their positive attributes, at the same time. And therein lies the problem. We human beings think in terms of either/or, but God created a world of AND. As in we’re selfish and we’re selfless; we’re kind and we’re mean; we’re judgmental and forgiving, each and every one of us. Nobody is all good or all bad, and alerting the world to the flaws of others never changes things at all. So the next time you start practicing your speech, you might want to ask yourself what little speech might someone be preparing for you?
Lisa Earle McLeod is a syndicated columnist, author, keynote speaker and business consultant who specializes in helping individuals and organizations create happiness and success. Her latest book is Finding Grace When You Can’t Even Find Clean Underwear – For more info – www.ForgetPerfect.com <http://www.ForgetPerfect.com>
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© Copyright 2008, by Lisa Earle McLeod. All rights reserved.
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